


Under Rich Relentless Skies

by BelaBellissima



Series: To Be Human [2]
Category: Wonder Woman (Movies - Jenkins)
Genre: (that don't end up actually killing the character bc happy ending), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Happy Ending, Justice League (2017) compliant, Terminal Illnesses, Themyscira (DCU), chief is napi, first in series is angst ending, gas poisoning, no profreading we die like mne, second in series is happy ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-30
Updated: 2020-08-30
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:47:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,600
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26190613
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BelaBellissima/pseuds/BelaBellissima
Summary: In which Steve survives the plane, has a rough couple of weeks, then gets his Happily Ever After.
Relationships: Diana (Wonder Woman)/Steve Trevor
Series: To Be Human [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1632796
Comments: 4
Kudos: 47





	Under Rich Relentless Skies

**Author's Note:**

> Me, showing up 5 months later with Starbucks and a face mask: hey guys wassup?
> 
> I know i said I would have this up after a few days but uh the world fell apart lmao. Anyway here it is!!! The beginning ~1800 words are the exact same, then it diverges. If you only want to read the happy, there's no need to read the angsty for background! :)

She’s never felt this kind of power before.

Then again – she’s never felt like this before.

Steve is dead. Blown up right in front of her. The sky is still lit up orange from the gas as it burns in the atmosphere.

Ares is blown back as she bursts from his trap, as she screams so loudly she’s sure even her mother can hear her on Themyscira. Can hear her pain and think _I told you they did not deserve you._

The Germans run from her. She chases, because they killed people, they lied and stole and made people into slaves, and she does not care anymore if it was Ares’ fault or not, because Steve is dead and Steve was _good._ For all that he thought he wasn’t, Steve is the best man she knows.

They shoot at her in fear as she destroys their ranks, bullets deflecting off her bracers with little sparks that light up in her eyes like the plane had only moments before. Diana knows Ares is watching this, watching and loving every moment as she lets go and acts like him, acts like _them_ , but she ignores him as he starts talking.

“Yes, Diana!” he cries, eyes wide with awe at her pure violence. “Take them all! Finally, you see.” He spreads his arms wide like her, gesturing to everything around them, at all the destruction being wreaked by Diana.

“Look at this world. Mankind did this, not me.”

Diana looks around slowly, taking in the roaring flames around her, the orange tint to the world from their sheer size. Her hair is flying around her face from the winds being kicked up, and she turns it to let it fly behind her. Ares stands before her again, his arms still out to his sides.

“They are ugly, filled with hatred, weak! Just like your Captain Trevor.”

Diana bares her teeth at her brother as he spits in the memory of Steve, degrading him and insulting his pure goodness. She takes a step forward to stack, but she flicks her eyes above him for only a second, to look at where their father once ruled as if to shame him for creating a son such as Ares.

She sees something falling through the sky, and it stops her anger in its tracks. The thing is spiraling, flipping endless as it flails and tries to right itself. A moment later it gives up, stops flailing, and a piece of cloth erupts above it, jerking it into a slower freefall, even as it continues to spin uncontrollably, and the cloth begins to fold and tangle up on itself.

Diana finally sees what it – _who_ – it is.

“Steve,” she breathes, and then she lunges forward, jumping over Ares who is expecting an attack and lets her go by him unknowingly. She leaps up as Steve falls closer, catching him perfectly as their two paths cross.

She creates a crater in the ground from the force of her landing, falling to her knees when her legs give out in relief.

The parachute tangles up around them, shielding the orange sky from view and sheltering the pair from the destruction around them.

“Diana?” he asks, still a little out of it from freefalling through the sky.

“Steve,” she says, holding him closer to her. “I thought you were dead.”

“Well, you know,” he says, trying to play it off. “One of the pilots had a parachute on them, and the timer was easy to change. I set it to ten seconds and jumped.”

Diana bows her head, pressing her forehead to his. She knows she only has a few seconds more before Ares will attack again, but she doesn’t want to leave Steve’s side.

“Do not move,” she demands, pulling back and looking into his eyes. “Stay here, out of the way. I will come for you after I have killed Ares.”

Steve just nods, releasing her as she sets him down and rips the parachute in half, rather than fish for the edge in the blowing wind.

She steps forward from the cloth, where her quarry awaits, stalking slowly toward her.

“Ares,” she growls. “You have caused enough evil today. Your wrath upon this world is over.”

Ares laughs, and Diana charges.

* * *

When it’s over, the skies begin to clear. The fires diffuse as soon as Ares is gone, bringing back the dark blue of the rising dawn. Soldiers all around her pull their masks off, relief evident on their faces. They begin to embrace each other, not caring whether their neighbor is one of them or one of Diana’s companions.

Napi approaches her afterward, offering his hand as Diana grasps it firmly. She smiles at him, and when he looks over her shoulder, she turns as well. Steve is sitting where she left him, still surrounded by the parachute, appearing almost childlike as he looks around the empty airfield.

“You’re lucky to get more time. Spend it well, Diana.”

She squeezes his hand once before releasing to go to Steve. Napi turns as well, returning to Sammy and Charlie’s sides.

Steve looks up at her as she approaches, a smile growing on his face.

“You did it,” he says breathily. He coughs a few times immediately afterward, his face scrunching up in pain momentarily.

“We did,” Diana says, kneeling down in front of Steve. “If you hadn’t stopped that plane, then who knows what might’ve happened.”

Steve reaches up, taking her face gently in his hands, a much happier mimicry than the fearful and resigned occurrence a few minutes before.

“You saved today,” Diana says softly, her own hands coming up to cover his.

“You saved the world,” Steve returns, pulling Diana closer to embrace her.

Diana stands smoothly, pulling Steve to his feet at the same time, quickly and without warning so that they’re still holding each other.

“Come,” she says, finally releasing Steve and grabbing his hand. He lets her hold on, lets her pull them toward their friends, leaving the torn-up parachute behind on the ground. “There is no more war, and it is Dawn. Let us get breakfast.”

Steve laughs. “I don’t think there’ll be any papers around to read.”

Diana smiles back. There will be time to experience everything later, but for now, she relishes in the feeling of having Steve alive next to her.

* * *

The feeling does not last.

Diana returns with Steve to London over the course of two weeks, celebrating in the streets among other people and placing flowers in front of the few memorials she sees. They visit the pub where they had picked up Sammy and Charlie, and Etta knocks a man out with a bottle within the first few minutes just before Diana and Steve walk in.

They see the glass on the ground and the man who had threatened Charlie sulking in the corner, his friends ribbing him for being beaten by a woman twice, and Diana smiles at her friend. Knowing that Etta has begun to demand respect in the way of the Amazons makes her joyous – she wouldn’t want her to be held back by her own preconceived and imagined restrictions.

Diana makes a mental note to teach her a few moves as she and Steve sit. Steve picks up the glass Napi had ordered for him, but takes only one sip before he starts coughing again. Diana thinks it’s because of the drink, that it might be something stronger than Steve is used to or he drank too fast. Steve haphazardly set the glass down as he grabs a handkerchief and coughs into it, but when he pulls it away, Diana sees specks of blood on the cloth.

“Steve?” she asks, already worried beyond belief.

Steve tries to answer her but begins coughing again, and when he finally stops, there is a noticeably large spot of blood in the center of the cloth.

“I’m fine,” he finally says, voice lightly hoarse as he tries to push through his discomfort.

He puts a hand on her knee, a silent plea not to bring it up among the others, who hadn’t seen the blood and are joking about Steve not being able to hold his liquor.

Diana narrows her eyes at him but obliges, turning back to the conversation with a strained smile. Napi catches her eyes, the look in his own gaze something understanding and apologetic, the kind where the person apologizing didn’t do anything wrong, but knows no other way to express sympathy and remorse to someone who had gone through something terrible.

The look unsettles Diana. The other demigod at the table knows something is wrong, and it looks like he’s upset there’s nothing he can do to help.

Napi looks back to the group, the moment of understanding between them over. Diana feels cold and reaches out to grasp Steve’s hand.

She waits for their gathering to end, for Etta to explain their new mission, how the Allied powers want them to search for an “Artifact,” though Diana knows it to really be a motherbox. The fact that the box of man has been unearthed unsettles her, but not enough to make her speak up. As long as the box is quiet, there is no reason to bring voice and power to it.

She knows she’ll find it later, will take it from the Americans before they can study it and use its powers to accidentally summon Steppenwolf, will bury it again so that it might be lost again should the time ever come when it needs to be kept from the New God.

For now, she helps Steve back to his small, sparse apartment after the night is over. Steve has another coughing fit from the cold air when they’re almost back, and Diana ends up needing to carrying him the last few blocks of the journey.

She sets him down as gently as she can on his bed, letting him sit against the headboard. He’s sweating profusely, thought the apartment and the night air is still incredibly cold.

“What is wrong, Steve? Why are you coughing up blood? What is happening?”

Steve shakes his head, grimacing slightly as he speaks. “I don’t know for sure, Diana. I don’t know.”

Diana doesn’t believe him, but she doesn’t pull out her lasso either.

“Do not lie to me, Steve Trevor. Not after everything we’ve fought against and survived.”

Steve gets a look in his eyes, a sad, defeated one that makes Diana’s heart race.

“There’s been a few reports throughout the war, of soldiers who were too close to gas but survived, only to die at home,” he says, taking her hand in his and pressing his lips to the back of her fingers.

“I got a lungful back at Veld.”

Diana remembers that, barely. She had walked through the town without any injury, the gas doing nothing to her because of the divinity within. She had been so angry with him at that time, thinking their deaths to be because Steve had prevented her from killing Ludendorff at the gala. He had coughed and stumbled on the edges but not fallen, not died like the villagers. She had thought that since he had not died then, he was safe from it.

She shakes her head slowly, disbelief and horror beginning to fill her. “No,” she says, refusing to accept it. “You can’t die, not when I got you back. The war is over, we’re supposed to be safe. We’re supposed to get breakfast and read the paper, and you should go to work, and I should get a job, and we should grow old together, Steve Trevor. You cannot die on me now.”

The look he sends her makes her heart break alongside his.

“There’s not really anything I can do to fight it, Diana. It’s out of my hands.”

Resolve fills her.

“But I can do something, Steve. I can do something.”

Diana stands abruptly, leaving Steve alone in his apartment as she leaps from the window and back to the streets. She runs back to the pub, where Napi is waiting outside for her. She grips his hands tightly as she speaks, not wanting to let go out of an irrational fear of him disappearing with any knowledge he might have.

“Napi,” she begs. “Please, do you know of any way to get back to my home? I will not be able to find it again, nor will Steve, but there’s a cure there. My sisters can help him.”

He nods once. “I might have something. It’s not a guarantee in any way, but it’s a hope.”

Diana shuts her eyes tightly, two stray tears of relief breaking free from the outside corners.

“Tell me what to do,” she says.

And he does.

* * *

Diana changes the course of the small boat as Steve dozes, buried in blankets to shelter him from the mist of the ocean and her cold winds, even in the middle of the day. The small amulet Napi had given her that enabled the possessor to see through divine illusions is warm in her palm. Diana can feel the magic it gives off, how it warms at the point as the boat shifts a few degrees.

She knows they’re headed in the right direction, but she doesn’t know if the charm will be enough to actually break through Zeus’s barrier. The two pantheons used vastly different types of magic, and like Napi said, there’s no guarantee that it will work like Diana must believe in order to not fall apart.

She already lost Steve once, she _can’t_ lose him again.

She looks up from where the amulet nestles in her hand, surprised to suddenly see fog. Diana closes her eyes in relief. They’re made it through the first half of the journey, and now she has to trust, to _believe_ that Napi’s gift will guide her to the center of the fog, not around and back out on the other side.

The amulet burns in her hand. The skies get progressively darker as the boat goes further into the fog, and Diana hears Steve moan behind her and cough himself awake. He’s only gotten worse in their week-long journey, his lungs deteriorating more and more each day from the hydrogen based gas that coats the insides still, even over three weeks later.

Diana rushes to him, helps prop him up to make it easier to breathe after the coughing fit ends. Blood drips from the corner of his mouth, bright red against pale, sallow skin. Diana knows he doesn’t have much time left – maybe three days at most, but even with all of the gifts the Amazons have, Diana doesn’t want to risk him being too far gone to bring back.

Diana brushes his sweaty, oily bangs back from his forehead. His head turns into the warmth of her hand, and she finally just lets it rest there, on the side of his face.

Sunlight illuminates them out of nowhere. Steve squeezes his eyes shut tightly and tries to turn his head away from straight up. Diana turns, looks in the directing the boat had been going, and sees Themyscira.

On the bluffs atop the cliffs, Diana can see her sisters training, dodging flying swords and daggers and arrows as easily as breathing.

“Thank Hera,” she whispers, smiling for the first time since she realized Steve was sick. She sets him down again, fixing the blankets over him and a light one over his eyes to protect them from Apollo’s rays. She adjusts the sail to the new direction of wind, laughing out loud as they fill and begin to push the boat along faster.

A minute later, one of her sisters notices her, and half of the Amazons training race as one to their horses and back down the path that leads to the beach, while the other half ready their bows to fire upon her should she be a threat. Diana knows they won’t be able to tell it’s her until the boat gets closer – she only knows what they’re doing because they are a giant force of people moving all together, not a sole sailor like her.

They break through the gates when the boat is halfway to shore, the blue of the ocean lightening the shallower it becomes. She perches on the bow, standing tall as she waves her arm high to signal who she is.

She can see when Venelia on the cliff shouts at the army to lower their bows, and when Menalippe on the ground orders her soldiers to put their swords away and help bring the boat ashore.

Her mother rides up when Diana’s boat is only a few dozen meters from shore, her cape flowing regally behind her as her horse canters to Menalippe’s side.

Hippolyta speaks only a moment with her new commander, then her head whips around to stare at Diana. She swings off her horse a moment later and races to the edge of the surf, reaching out. Diana’s boat hits the shore at the same moment and comes to a grating stop, and she jumps down and into her mother’s arms.

“Diana,” she whispers fiercely into her daughter’s ear. “I thought I would never see you again.”

“I’m home, mother. I found a way around Zeus’ shield.”

Hippolyta kisses her forehead, her eyes shutting in relief. “It is good to have you back, Diana. To lose you and Antiope so closely together, it was the greatest sorrow I have ever known.”

Diana pulls away slightly, enough that there is space between her mother and she, but they are still close enough to hold on to each other’s arms.

“Mother, I came back to ask something of you, and I know you will not like it.”

Hippolyta frowns slightly, barely visible beneath her crown. “What is it Diana?”

“I ask for healing in Apollo’s temple, not for me, but for a man.”

Hippolyta immediately scowls. “Did you truly bring one of them back with you?”

Diana nods. “The same man as before, Steve Trevor. He is dying, slowly, from the very weapon he sought to destroy. You should’ve seen it mother, the horrors of this weapon – an entire town was killed in seconds. There was no way to save any of them, but Steve, I can save. Please, Mother. He will die if he is not helped soon.”

Hippolyta looks over Diana’s shoulder, to where Steve is rolled up in the blankets. He coughs in the moment, turning over on his side to retch. The only thing he manages to spit up is more blood. When he’s done, he flops once again to his back, exhausted and shivering despite the heat and his many blankets.

Hippolyta looks down at the beach for a moment more before nodding shallowly once. “Bring him ashore, Diana,” she allows. “We will see if we can help him.”

Diana squeezes her mother’s arms once in thanks, then turns and jumps back into the boat. It rocks once, making Steve moan in pain again as he’s jostled. Diana thinks he is unaware of his surroundings by this point, just existing in a fever haze as he waits to die.

She picks him up, blankets and all, and jumps back to the shore, passing him to Hippolyta to carry. He lets out another moan and Diana spares him a brief look of concern, before approaching Menalippe’s horse and mounting it with her aid.

They gallop away in and instant, the gravel and sand of the beach kicking up in their wake. Steve’s breath hitches at the jostling, but Diana would rather get him to Apollo’s temple as quickly as possible, even if it means putting him through brief discomfort.

The ride is short and long at the same time. Realistically, Diana knows it only takes a few minutes to reach the temple, but it seems to drag on and on. Hippolyta’s own horse arrives moments after Diana dismounts, and she walks with her daughter up to the entrance.

Inside the temple, two rows of flame line the walkway, leading to the altar in the back. Herbs and spices decorate the slab of marble, and the scent is sweet and homey to Diana. She hasn’t smelled it in far too long, and the nostalgia the smell leaves her with is enough to bring a small smile to her face as she approaches.

She sets Steve down, removing his cocoon of blankets as she spreads him out on the altar. The Amazons that are watching over the temple for the time being disappear with a wave of Hippolyta’s hand, off to get the elixir that will hopefully heal Steve.

Diana brushes his hair off his forehead again and presses a small kiss to the revealed skin.

The Amazons who left return, and one hands a small clay jar to Diana. She takes it with one hand and a murmur of thanks, using her other to lift Steve’s head to help him drink. She tips it to his mouth, gently coaxing him to drink a few sips. He can’t drink too much or it will hurt him more, but if he drinks too little, it won’t aid at all.

He frowns and tries to move his head away as soon as the liquid touches his lips, protesting with a slight mumble.

“Drink, Steve,” Diana asks, tipping the jar a little farther so that the first trickle can drip into his slightly parted mouth.

Something in him must recognize what she’s asking, because he stops trying to fight and begins to sip at the stream of medicine. After a few seconds, he begins to drink more readily, leaning forward as best he can from how he’s lying down to get closer to the jar Diana holds.

She lets him drink a few gulps, until his skin loses its sickly sheen just enough that the worry inside her begins to ease. She tilts the jar down, cutting off the flow of elixir. She hands it behind her without looking away from him, trusting that someone will take it from her.

Steve tries to sit up and follow it, but Diana gently pushes on his shoulder until he’s lying prone on the altar again. He mumbles something, but Diana knows he’s still stuck in the fever haze and it will not make sense.

She shushes him gently. “Sleep, Steve,” she whispers. “Heal and know that you are safe.”

He finally quiets and relaxes underneath her hand, falling asleep as the elixir begins to take real effect. Diana steps back, away from the altar and into her mother’s arms.

“He is strong,” Hippolyta whispers into her ear. “He will recover.”

Diana grasps her mother’s arm tightly. “I pray you are correct. I already almost lost him once, I cannot lose him again.”

Hippolyta guides her away from the altar, back towards the entrance of the temple. “He will need to rest for several hours, Diana. Tell your sisters and I about how the world of man has changed while he does. We shall have a grand feast to celebrate your return.”

Diana takes one last look at Steve when she reaches the exit, a longing expression on her face for a few moments, before stepping outside after her mother.

“Very well, mother,” she agrees.

The food is already being cooked, Menalippe and Venelia having begun the preparations sometime after Diana had raced off. Every Amazon she passes greets her with a smile and praise, welcoming her back with open arms.

They set her down at the head of their great hall, and listen to her speak about London and its dreary grey fog.

“It was polluted,” Diana says, painting the picture for her sisters as clearly as if they had been there themselves. “People were shouting on the streets, babies cry because their mothers couldn’t afford to buy food and had to beg. The clothing there was horrendous, impossible to fight in without tearing.”

Her sisters comment their horror, their disbelief and pride for their homeland in whispers and talk amongst their neighbors, but they fall silent when Diana continues to speak.

“The men control everything. Women aren’t allowed in their war rooms and councils.”

A cry of shock and outrage rises up and is silenced again.

“There are battles within them, one nation fighting another and taking everything from them. Soldiers are left to die on the battlefield while the generals remain in the safety of their home country. Whole towns are murdered for demonstrations of power.”

Diana pauses, considering her next words.

“But there is still good there.”

Disbelief ripples through her sisters.

“People dance and sing in times of peace. They love each other fiercely. They refuse money from those they know are less fortunate. They can spin stories and lift the hearts of those around them. They sell sweets to people, and put on puppet shows for children.”

Diana closes her eyes and remembers.

“They sacrifice themselves for the ones they love, because they know and believe that they will live on because of it. They know they are not good, but they try anyway to be so.”

The Amazons are silent. They watch Diana, eyes wide and minds open, not wanting to hope that humans might still be worth their protection.

Diana opens her eyes.

“Ares is dead,” she says. “I killed him, and when I did, the soldiers stopped fighting. Others didn’t need his influence, but many were affected. He was hiding, pretending to search for peace. Their most deadly weapon was destroyed, and the world is celebrating the end of the war.”

Diana looks to her mother. Hippolyta looks proud, a soft smile adorning her lips. Diana frowns, because what she says next will hurt her mother dearly.

“Even though the war is over, I must return to their world. The motherbox of man was unearthed. I must bury it again.”

Horror mars Hippolyta’s face, and panic and unease spreads throughout her sisters.

“When the time comes, we will fight, but for now, I will prepare the world of man as best I can and remain there to watch for signs of _his_ return. However, I will not leave for a few weeks, so for now, let us eat!”

Diana smiles when her sisters begin to celebrate, knowing that her tale is over. Her mother is the only one still frowning, but Diana expected that to be the case.

Hippolyta sits down next to Diana, warping an arm around her daughter.

“You make me proud Diana, but I wish you would stay here. You know I do.”

Diana leans against her mother and agrees. “I do know, but my duty comes before my happiness. The world is worthy of being saved still – it only needs a little guidance to get there.”

Her mother nods, putting the subject behind them as the first platters of food begin to circulate the hall.

* * *

It is dark out by the time they finish feasting. Diana rides up to the temple of Apollo as soon as she is free, no longer being held back to talk to her sisters. Steve is still lying on the altar, sleeping.

He looks much healthier than he did earlier, his skin back to its normal color. He’s no longer sweating with fever, and his breath is quiet, no longer the rattling it had become the last two days at sea.

Diana cups his cheek in her hand, smiling when Steve stirs from his sleep and opens his eyes to look up at her.

“Hey there,” he says, smiling cheekily, though still tiredly.

“Hello, Steve,” she says, tilting her head to the other side. “You’re going to be fine. You’re recovering, but the medicine we gave you and the latent power of Apollo’s temple is healing you.”

A confused look crosses his face. “Wha?” he slurs.

“We’re on Themyscira again,” she clarifies. “Mother allowed me to bring you ashore and into the temple to help you.”

A stunned, amazed look is his response. “Didn’t know I made such an impression.”

Diana smiles. “Do not worry, Steve. She likes you at least a little bit. She would not have let you leave with me had that not been the case.”

Steve smiles. “Good to know.”

His eyes begin to flicker shut, fatigue overtaking him again from him using up his energy to speak to Diana. She smiles at him and removes her hand from his cheek.

“Sleep. I’ll be here in the morning when you wake.”

He nods and drifts off again, Diana keeps guard, and when the first rays of sun peek over the ocean directly into the temple, illuminating the fresco on the wall depicting Apollo’s chariot, Steve stirs.

Diana takes his hand, and he squeezes back.

They both know they’ll be fine.

* * *

After a heartfelt goodbye between Diana and her mother after three weeks together, Diana and Steve leave, sailing away from her home island with the promise to return every decade or so now that they know Napi’s amulet can break through Zeus’ shield.

They retrieve the motherbox, much to the relief of several Allied governments, and Diana promptly steals it away and buries it again in America, much to the frustration of the same governments. Diana doesn’t really care: she didn’t like the rules of men during the war, and now in peace she finds her opinion has not changed much. Besides, the motherbox is far too powerful to be in the hands of mortal men.

Napi smiles at the two of them when they catch up, and Diana thanks him endlessly and completely for his aide. The others still do not know about him, even Steve, who thinks the amulet was something Diana had brought with her the first time they left. Napi did her a great service – the least she can do is let him remain anonymously human.

They decide to move to America during the twenties, and Steve asks her to marry him while dancing, the first snowfall of the winter of 1923 drifting gently around them. They move back to England when the Depression hits, and Diana helps people who have nowhere else to turn. The entire world is falling apart from the crash, and Diana and Steve both sense when there’s another war beginning to broil.

They discover that Steve isn’t aging like he should, and it makes them both celebrate. He doesn’t grow older – he stays the same, immortal with Diana because of the elixir that healed him.

Steve enlists when the war finally breaks out, and Diana stays by his side. Napi, Charlie, and Sammy don’t – Napi had returned to his home in central Canada to help his people there, Charlie had returned to Ireland and settled down, and Sammy had finally been able to get a role in the theatre.

Etta follows Diana, learning medicine and travelling the front as a nurse, helping the wounded in whatever way she can. Steve and Diana free concentration camps and fight the Germans again, though no record of her interference is ever written down.

The war ends and they move back to America. Another war starts, they fight, and it ends. The cycle repeats over and over. The two return to Themyscira for a few months every decade, and Diana wishes she could bring their other friends too, could grant Charlie and Sammy and Etta the same immortality as Steve and Napi.

They know it won’t happen though, and Charlie grows old and dies surrounded by children and grandchildren, his wife at his side. Sammy has a stunning career in the theatre, and he dies with a smile on his face and laughter in his heart from a life well lived. Etta marries a soldier she saved in the second world war and dies much like Charlie, surrounded by family, friends, and numerous loved ones.

Technology and weapons improve, and Diana fears for the future. Even with Ares dead, the innovation and brutality of man astounds her. The goodness does too though, and she can’t bring herself to ever give up on them no matter what they do.

The new century comes around, and Diana doesn’t realize that the motherbox is uncovered once again. The two are living in Paris, and Diana works at the Louvre. She goes to America when she realizes one of the truly vile men of the world has a copy of the photograph from Veld – she can’t risk anyone discovering her or Steve.

She fights a monster, and watches another good man die. She’s selfishly glad Steve is still in France.

Bruce Wayne approaches her after, pitches the idea of a team, and she hesitantly doesn’t refuse. He tracks down the original photo, removing the last traces of her fear that anyone will discover her and Steve’s secret, and the gesture is enough to make her decide that she will fight by his side.

When the temple of the Amazons lights up in a bonfire of holy flame, she knows that it’s time. She goes to Bruce in Gotham, leaving Steve behind in France where it’s safe. He doesn’t like it in the slightest, but listens to her pleas just the same.

And then Bruce Wayne makes an ass and an idiot of himself. Diana shoves him away from her when he accuses her of shutting herself away from the world – she has fought in every battle that threatened the world. Just because there was no record of her didn’t mean she didn’t fight.

He calls Steve her boyfriend and claims that he died. Diana knows they believe that to be so, she spoke of him often enough, but saying that she had lost him once was true – she had thought him dead after that plane blew up, and the grief was still there, even after a century of being with him and knowing him to be alive still.

Barry Allen stands with her, saying they’ll all back her up if she murders Bruce. Diana thinks he’s adorable – he reminds her of Etta and her innocence so much. It won’t be needed, because even though he’s an ass, Diana won’t actually follow through and kill Bruce.

Arthur accidentally spills that he thinks she’s beautiful, and Diana wants to laugh. He won’t get anywhere with her, and he needs to figure that out quickly. He reminds her of Napi though – half human and half something else, a being of two worlds with powers to match.

Victor Stone is there too, reminded her of Sammy. He’s been kept out of so much and kicked down because of who he is – a mix of man and machine that won’t be treated fully human, wouldn’t be even if he was just a man because of the color of his skin. He’s forced into a fight he never wanted to partake in – all he wanted was to play football.

And Bruce, Bruce reminds her of Charlie. He’s seen too much to be fully okay. He got his dark sides, but he’s also got some light there too, just waiting for the right opportunity to show itself. She knows he thinks himself to be an already hopeless case, but she can see that as long as he tries, he can find the good in him that she already sees.

“He isn’t my boyfriend, you know,” she tells him after helping relocate his shoulder.

Bruce hums in question.

“He’s my husband,” she says. Something in Bruce shuts itself away, but he still questions her and ignores the feeling. Diana knows he had thought highly of her, and she thinks _maybe, if Steve had truly died._

“I thought he died at the end of the war. When did you have time to get married?”

Diana smiles softly. “In winter of 1924. He proposed the year before.”

Bruce frowns. “Then who was the person you loved and lost?”

Diana takes a deep breath. “Many people. Many sisters and family members. My best friend Etta died in 1974. Charlie two years before, Sammy in 82. My aunt Antiope threw herself in front of a bullet for me before I ever left home in the first place.”

Bruce flinches almost unnoticeably, and Diana continues.

“But yes, I did believe Steve to be dead for a few minutes in the war. He had flown a plane up into the sky and I saw it explode. I almost destroyed everything I stand for, almost gave in to Ares before I noticed him falling through the sky and caught him.”

“So, he survived the war then, and you two got married,” Bruce clarifies, a hint of puzzlement still evident.

Diana nods.

“Then didn’t you still lose him? He had to have died at the latest in the eighties, unless he somehow managed to live beyond a hundred years.”

Diana smiles, a small secretive thing that makes Bruce raise an eyebrow in surprise.

“He’s still alive?” he asks, and Diana nods again.

“He took a breath of gas during the war and it made his lungs slowly deteriorate. I took him to Themyscira and begged my mother to heal him. An unintended, though not unwelcome, side-affect included immorality. He’s still only 34 in body.”

Bruce lets out an impressed huff of air, but Diana can see a hint of pain lingering. She wonders if it has anything to do with the case she had just been looking at, the one out in the main room of the cave with the bloodied, spray-painted suit illuminated within. She knows he’s lost many people in his life – it must hurt to know there might have been a way to save them.

She drifts back to the door, looking behind her once she waits in the threshold.

“Come on, Bruce. We have a world to save.”

* * *

They fight Steppenwolf, defeating him with ease after Kal comes back to life. He reminds Diana of Steve, the final person in her old team to be represented. Kal is a good man, and he fights every day to make the world better.

Only, he’s a bit confused at first.

With the New God gone, life returns to normal. The rest of the team stay in America, where they’ve grown up and live, but Diana returns to France and her job at the Louvre. She misses Steve terribly, misses breakfast in bed with him and reading the paper side by side on the couch. She misses dancing in the snow, misses the way his eyes light up when they joke about growing old together in mind and spirit.

She misses dancing with him at night in the living room of their flat, swaying to music playing on the radio. She wants to hold him and be in his arms.

Bruce’s jet touches down at the private airfield at eleven at night. Diana knows Steve is probably already asleep, and since it will take another hour to get back to their flat, she doesn’t think she’ll be able to hold him reassure herself that he’s fine until the morning when they wake.

But she opens the door to their apartment and he’s there, waiting, resting against the back of the couch with his arms by his sides. He smiles at her, and Diana rushes forward, leaving the door wide open and she holds on to him and smiles.

Eventually the door gets closed, and after each makes sure the other is fine, they dance, swaying back and forth in the living room to the sound of their hearts beating.

**Author's Note:**

> [Find me online!](https://linktr.ee/belabellissima)


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